Hereafter (22 page)

With the crowd writhing behind me, I hugged the railing as if to escape them. But escape to where, honestly? I spared one glance below me, to the river.

The water rose up to me, swelled by almost three weeks of Oklahoma’s spring storms. I’d never seen the water so high or so churned by the speeding current. The river seemed to foam at the edges, frothing like a rabid dog. The sight of it sent a deep, piercing chill through me.

And yet . . .

What if I just . . . jumped?

I leaned farther over the rail, staring into the water. Sure, I was a few stories up, and the river looked more dangerous than I’d ever seen it. But maybe I could get away from the party if I leaned forward just a little more . . . ?

I gasped and pulled myself back from the guardrail, shaking my head in fear. What on earth had given me that impulse, made me think I could just jump down and swim away? Where had that so obviously lethal idea
come
from?

At that moment I’d never felt so strong an urge in my life: I wanted to be away from this place. Away from this crowd of strangers and the bizarre smoke hovering—seemingly without a source—above them. Away from this river.

I stared back into the crowd, desperate to find someone I knew. Someone who could get me out of here.

At that moment I caught his eye again. Mr. Rock Star. He watched me from behind an array of faces, now wearing an unmistakable smirk. I don’t know how I knew, but instantly, I just
did
—he could see the fear in my eyes. And he was enjoying it.

Before I could call out to him, to tell him to leave me alone, another face popped in front of his. When Serena gave me a broad grin, I nearly fainted with relief. She brushed aside the partyers until she broke through to stand in front of me.

“Serena, thank God—”

“Amelia!” she interrupted with a happy cry, and then threw her arms around my neck in a fierce hug.

The motion was too forceful, and it nearly rocked me over the railing. I grabbed onto the edge of the curved metal, clawing desperately against its smooth surface.

“Serena, let me up!” I screamed.

Immediately, she dropped her arms, and I was able to plant myself against the railing once more. But instead of checking my safety or even calming me down, Serena turned back to the swaying mass on the bridge.

“Hey, all you people,” she said, slurring each word. I’d never heard her so drunk. “Did you know it’s Amelia’s eighteenth birthday?”

In response, the entire crowd shifted its focus to us. The effect was disturbing, as if hundreds of eyes had simultaneously riveted on me. Now I could just make out Doug’s blue eyes, no more than twenty feet away. Mr. Rock Star’s eyes also reappeared, sparkling coldly, close to Doug’s. Above all of them, the black shapes still floated, slipping over and around each figure.

Suddenly, the partyers all began to speak again, but this time they spoke only one word. The same word, repeated over and over again in a hundred different voices.

My name.

Still staring at them, Serena leaned back against me, and her weight pushed me farther over the rail. My feet actually lifted up off the asphalt and swayed slightly in the air.

The motion should have horrified me. Yet when Serena spun back around to face me, I found myself transfixed by her eyes.

They were unfocused, as anyone’s would be if they were drunk enough. I’d seen her eyes affected by drink before, plenty of times. But whatever clouded Serena’s eyes now, it certainly wasn’t alcohol. Her eyes seemed too wide and vacuous, the pupils so enlarged that only a thin line of blue circled them.

Serena looked possessed.

When she leaned in to me this time, I flinched. But my fear didn’t deter Serena. She closed the space between us, pushing me farther and farther over the bridge until I was parallel with the river. Then Serena grasped my shoulders and, in a raspy whisper, said, “Happy birthday, bestie.”

With a strange, too-wide grin, she let go of my shoulders.

That movement was all it took.

My scarce balance upon the guardrail vanished. I rolled backward and hovered for what seemed like an eternity on the edge of the railing. Then I fell, tipping over the metal. Beneath, I could hear the water, foaming and slavering as the river rushed up to meet me. Just before I hit the water, I could hear a chorus of shouts above me.

At that moment the flash ended.

For a while I’d almost forgotten I was experiencing a flash. But the past blurred and faded, and I was once again back in the river, staring up at the bridge.

A terrible realization dawned on me. I didn’t know how or why, but when this latest flash ended, it didn’t take me back to the present and the relative safety of my graveyard. Instead, the flash left me still flailing in the river, still experiencing what I’d initially thought was just another afterlife nightmare.

So, the flash hadn’t ended. Not really. Because this was the present, in a sense. I was still here, in the river, on the night of my eighteenth birthday. And, suddenly, Doug and Serena were still staring down at me with wild eyes.

“Doug, she sees us!” Serena shrieked. “Amelia sees us!”

Doug didn’t respond to her proclamation, nor did he break eye contact with me. He just grinned like a crazy person and, as Serena had done before the flash, waved at me.

I could still see the shadows, dark and swirling around my friends. I knew what they were now. Those shadows could be nothing other than the trapped souls from the netherworld. Eli’s minions. The mindless orchestrators of this entire evening.

“Doug, Serena, please. I can’t . . .”

My voice came out even fainter than it had before the flash. I could feel myself losing the fight against the current. I was far too weak to swim out of the stormy waters now; I knew it. I would need their help.

Help they didn’t necessarily seem inclined to provide me. Doug and Serena looked like statues, standing stock-still on the bridge.

“Please,” I called out once more, as loudly as I could.

At the sound of my watery voice, Serena turned toward the crowd of partyers behind her. She called out to them, her voice rising to a hysterical octave over their laughter.

“Hey, everyone! Let’s sing ‘Happy Birthday’!”

I shook my head feebly. I wanted to scream out to the crowd, to beg them not to listen to Serena. To tell them they were all being controlled by dark spirits, driven wild and out of their minds. But my voice, like my arms, seemed to be on the brink of failure. Instead, I stared at Serena and pled silently with my eyes.

Serena looked back at me with a suddenly determined stare. I breathed a huge sigh of relief. Her expression could only mean one thing: she’d decided to call for help. The police, an ambulance, maybe even my parents. Whoever came, I didn’t care so long as someone pulled me out of this water.

But when Serena finally spoke, she did so calmly, warmly. With no sense of urgency at all.

“This one’s for you, Amelia, baby,” she said, and then turned toward the crowd. “Ready, everyone? Okay!”

A unison of voices surged from the bridge, like a choir.

“Happy birthday, dear Amelia . . .”

“No!” I screamed, trying to struggle once more against the waves.

But of course, my scream never rose above a hoarse whisper, and my struggles were nothing compared to the control the current now had over my body. I was fast losing my ability to stay afloat, much less escape the drag of the current.

With horrifying clarity, I realized what was happening. The people above me were too crazed, too lost, to help me. I wouldn’t regain my strength. And I would continue to weaken in my fight against the river.

There was only one way this scene could end.

No!
I screamed in my head.
This doesn’t have to happen again. I can change this. I don’t have to die this time, I don’t!

“Help!” I screamed aloud, but my energy was almost completely gone and the scream echoed only in my mind. My head bobbed underwater and stayed there for a few seconds. When the current bobbed me back up to the surface, I gasped in fear.

The gasp didn’t have much of a lifespan, because the current almost immediately yanked me back down. Once under, I continued to gulp for air, swallowing more water in the process. The current spun me around and finally pulled me to the other side of the bridge before it lifted me out of the water again.

Coughing and sputtering, I looked up at the bridge, now from the opposite side from which I’d fallen. I could just make out the rain-blurred figures of Doug and Serena running to this side of the bridge. I tried to reach out to them, but I couldn’t even bring my arm above the surface of the river.

Only then did I notice Serena hold something out to me. It was her hand, once again extended over the railing toward me. She gave me another cheerful wave, flailing her arm joyously in the thick rain.

Her bright smile was the last thing I saw before my head bobbed back down for the third, and final, time. I didn’t see anything after that.

Chapter
Twenty-four

I
woke up, still wheezing and gasping. My fingers twitched frantically, grasping around me.

At first I couldn’t feel anything, which only terrified me more. Then I felt the dull pressure of something beneath me—something solid. I turned my head as far to the right as it would go and saw dusty yellow, just inches from my face. As I squinted, the scene came into greater focus. I could see dark brown threads woven through the yellow. It took me a moment to realize the brown was my hair, fanned out upon the dried grass beneath my head.

Above me, all I could see were stars. I pushed myself up and scanned my surroundings. Far off to the west, the sky had turned a faint violet, wherein the sun had just set behind the mountains. Elsewhere, the night had already begun to darken into deep purples and blues.

And yet, even in the darkness, I recognized the curves and twists of the familiar headstones around me. I was in my graveyard again.

I reached around and tenderly touched the back of my head, at the place where it had connected with my gravestone. Nothing. No dried blood or wound, although, inexplicably, my head still throbbed slightly. I pressed my hand to my chest, just above my heart. No thumping there. No pulse.

I was dead again. For the first time that fact made me happy.

Still seated, I turned to my gravestone. Even in the dim light I could see the enormous crack now running down its center. If the gravestone hadn’t really hurt me, then I had certainly hurt it.

Well, Dad had always said that I had a hard head.

At the thought of my father, I glanced quickly at his headstone. It was still intact; and, for some reason, I sighed in relief.

Then my head shot back up and I searched for the next most important menace in my afterlife. A cursory scan of the graveyard, however, let me know that Eli Rowland had disappeared.

I looked down at my arm, where a slight bruise seemed to have formed around the place Eli had gripped me. Gingerly, I touched my bottom lip and found a thick cut there. Neither injury hurt. Yet, despite their impossibility, they were very real.

I sighed again and sat backward, pulling my legs to my chest and wrapping my arms around them. I needed to leave this place, and soon. But right now I needed to think.

First things first, I remembered my death, obviously. Every horrible moment of it. I could see now where my nightmares always began. They started at the moment I first fell into the river; at the moment the river sapped me of my energy, before I surfaced just long enough to watch my friends, controlled by some dark—and definitely evil—power, watch me die.

In some ways, then, my nightmares had been merciful. The universe or fate or even my own mind had forced me to reexperience my death many times but hadn’t, until now, put me through the worst of it.

These new, disturbing memories brought something else to light, as well.

Eli had been there, watching, waiting with malicious glee. Mr. Rock Star, with his knowing smirk and cold glare. Serena hadn’t pushed me, nor had Eli, obviously. But Eli certainly had something to do with my fall. He controlled the black shapes (so much like the ones in the netherworld, I couldn’t doubt their origin), which had surrounded the partygoers and possessed them, prevented them from helping me.

As I rubbed my wrist absently, I couldn’t help but wonder what Eli had done: angered me so much, worked me into such a frenzy, that I would transport myself back to the very memory he’d referenced?

If so, then the strength of this forced materialization gave me another idea. Clearly, I was able to move through time and space, if not yet entirely by will. But I also felt sure I had additional, undiscovered powers. I now believed Eli’s claim that ghosts could do the extraordinary, particularly when we entered into a state of heightened emotion. My injuries provided one item of proof.

I thought then of the chair that had screeched backward when I’d stood up too quickly in the Wilburton High School library. That chair had moved just after I saw my in memoriam senior photo, just after I’d experienced a great surge of emotion.

And what about my years of nightmarish materializations, or the new crack on my gravestone?

Apparently, Eli wasn’t the only one with poltergeist-like powers. I too could materialize and affect stationary objects. But could I do more? How much of the ghostly and living worlds could I influence?

Asking such questions made me recall the best part of the living world I’d experienced so far.

Joshua.

If I could affect things in both worlds, maybe I could protect Joshua from Eli. If I could keep Eli from touching me—from hurting me, or angering me into an unwanted materialization—then I might have some power against him. Could I possibly hurt Eli? Make him bruise or bleed, like he’d done to me? Just enough to stop him from harming Joshua.

Maybe, if I focused hard enough, I could do . . . something. Whatever that something might be.

“Amelia!”

The unexpected shout made me leap into a crouch, clenching the grass and snarling in the direction of the voice. At the thought, the very insinuation, that Eli had reappeared, I went completely feral.

I must have looked completely crazy, too, when Joshua, not Eli, came running up to me. Seeing my wild stance, Joshua skidded to a stop.

“Amelia?” he asked again, more timidly.

I dropped out of the crouch and onto my knees. I felt humiliated, terrified, confused. Joshua’s eyes were also wide with fright.

“Are you really here?” he whispered. “I’m not crazy, right? I’m not, like, imagining you?”

“No,” I said, uncurling and reaching out to him with one arm. “You’re not crazy. I’m as real as a ghost can be.”

Joshua surprised me by diving across the grass, dropping to his knees, and pulling me to him with dizzying speed.

“Oh my God, Amelia,” he murmured in my hair. “Is it possible to be really mad at you and really relieved at the same time?”

“Probably.” I laughed, hugging him close. I pressed my face against his pale blue shirt and sighed. “I’m sorry, Joshua. So sorry. I mean, I’m glad I did it alone, but I’m not glad I did it the
way
I did.”

“What did you do, exactly?”

“I materialized in the graveyard. I met with Eli, and some stuff happened—bad stuff, including a nightmare—and then I just woke up. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you what I was trying to do. I just didn’t want you to follow me, if it worked, because I didn’t want you to get hurt. But obviously you did follow me, because here you are, and here I am—”

Joshua cut off my babbling with a tense laugh. “Do you know how many graveyards there are in Wilburton? Way too many.”

“Oh, God, I’m so sorry,” I moaned again.

Joshua grabbed my face with both hands, gently but firmly lifting it until our eyes met. “Amelia, you can’t ever do that again, okay? Not unless you want to kill me, too.”

“I’m sorry,” I repeated once more. Then I shook my head. “I just keep having to apologize to you, don’t I?”

“If you promise you’ll at least tell me before you do something like that again, then you don’t have to apologize.”

I held up one hand in a pledge. “I promise. I will always, always tell you before I do something stupid from now on.”

Joshua nodded, looking slightly mollified. “Okay. Now a second promise: you’ll never go see Eli without me.”

“How about if both of us never see him again?”

Joshua blinked. “Well, that would be more than fine with me. But how’s that going to happen?”

“I learned a few things today,” I said. “I have so much to tell you. But first, I think I have some powers too, just like Eli does. I’m not sure which ones yet, but I think if I get worked up enough, I can use them against him.”

Joshua arched one eyebrow. “So, you think he’ll show back up again?”

“Definitely, but who knows when . . .”

I trailed off, frowning and staring down at the grass without really seeing it. As I thought back over my early-morning conversation with Eli, something struck me as odd. For the first time, I processed something Eli had said, just before he’d told me I’d been pushed off High Bridge. Something about having another appointment today.

A song suddenly filtered through my head, tinny and faint.

We’ll meet again. . . .

I felt an eerie tingle race across my skin, and it had nothing to do with Joshua’s touch.

“Joshua, Eli wasn’t at your house today, was he?”

“Not that I know of.”

“Are you sure?”

He laughed. “Pretty sure, yeah.”

“Have you checked on everyone in your family?” I insisted.

Joshua’s laugh faded. “Well, no, but—”

“How long was I gone?” I interrupted.

“You’ve been gone all day. It’s still Friday. But it’s Friday night now.”

“Where’s the rest of your family?”

“Mom and Dad are out for their date-night. And Jillian’s taking advantage by going out, too.”

“Out?”

“Jillian came home from school all excited about this party tonight. She made fun of me for not wanting to go—I didn’t, because I figured I’d be looking for you all night—and then she invited all her stupid friends over to get ready. I guess I should have followed them, but I was worried about you.”

The story bothered me, particularly the part about the party. My head snapped up, and I met Joshua’s eyes again.

“I . . . I think we need to go check on Jillian,” I said. “Sooner would probably be better than later.”

Not yet attuned to my mood, Joshua chuckled. “Jillian wouldn’t appreciate me pulling the big-brother card on her, you know.”

“Still,” I mused, biting my lip and carrying on an internal debate. Finally, I nodded. “Joshua, the night I died, I was at a party on High Bridge for my birthday. The party . . . well, I’m pretty sure the party is the reason I died. And Eli and his minions made it all happen.”

I could practically hear Joshua’s thoughts shift in tone. “What exactly does that mean to us now?” he asked quietly.

“I have no idea. Maybe nothing. But I have a weird feeling about this. What if Eli tried to get to us another way? Like maybe through this party, and what he could do to the people there?”

“Do you really think he’d do that?”

“I don’t know—nothing seems beneath him at this point.”

A sudden, chirping electronic noise interrupted my worrying. Joshua also seemed surprised by the noise, because he jerked upright too quickly and jostled me in his arms.

The noise chirped again, insistent, so he reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone. He flipped open the tiny device and began clicking away at its keys.

“It’s a text from Jillian, inviting me to the party.”

“A text?”

“It’s like an email, but on your phone,” he murmured, clearly not interested in explaining technology to me at this moment. I couldn’t blame him. Nor was I surprised when, after he read the text, his mouth tightened into a grimace and he loosened his hold on me.

“Where’s the party supposed to be?” I asked, shutting my eyes in dread. I felt a strange, sudden ache at my temples as if in response to my fears.

“High Bridge Road.”

Everything screeched to a halt. Nothing had moved, and nothing had changed; but I felt as though I were sitting at ground zero at the exact moment before a nuclear bomb detonates.

“Joshua?” I whispered.

He frowned deeply before looking up at me. I easily read the emotions in his eyes: uncertainty, yes, but also a deep, growing fear.

We continued to stare at each other, both of us momentarily frozen. In mere seconds a barrage of thoughts ran through my mind. How fast could Joshua get to the river? Did Eli have something to do with this? And if he had, what could I do to make him stop?

My head started to throb in earnest now. Only Joshua’s voice broke through its buzzing.

“Want to go to a party, Amelia?” he whispered, panic edging into his voice.

“I think that’s a good plan,” I whispered back. Without another word the two of us were up and sprinting toward the entrance of the graveyard.

“I’ll drive,” Joshua called back to me.

“Then drive as fast as you possibly—”

A burst of fire, bright and less than fifty feet away, ended my sentence and stopped both of us short.